The House Of Silk

have made of the Irish serving boy and his relationship with the rest of them? And what would he have seen as his eyes swept across the room? ‘You see, Watson, but you do not observe.’ He had said it often enough and never had I felt it to be more true. The kitchen knife lying on the table, the soup bubbling on the hearth, the brace of pheasants hanging from a hook in the pantry, Kirby casting his eyes downwards, his wife standing with her hands on her apron, Patrick still smiling … would they have told him something more than they told me? Undoubtedly. Show Holmes a drop of water and he would deduce the existence of the Atlantic. Show it to me and I would look for a tap. That was the difference between us.
    We went back upstairs and all the way to the top floor. As we climbed up, we passed a young girl, hurrying the other way with a bowl and two towels. This was Elsie, the scullery maid. She kept her head down and I saw nothing of her face. She brushed past us and was gone.
    Carstairs knocked gently at the door, then entered his sister’s bedroom to see if she would receive a visit from me. I waited outside with Mrs Carstairs. ‘I will leave you here, Dr Watson,’ said she. ‘It will only distress my sister-in-law if I go in. But please let me know if there is anything that you notice that has a bearing on her illness.’
    ‘Of course.’
    ‘And thank you again for coming. I feel so relieved to have you as my friend.’
    She swept away just as the door opened and Carstairs invited me in. I entered a close, plushly furnished bedroom built into the eaves with small windows, the curtains partly drawn and a fire burning in the grate. I noticed that a second door opened into an adjoining bathroom and the smell of lavender bath salts was heavy in the air. Eliza Carstairs was lying in bed, propped up with pillows and wearing a shawl. I could see at once that her health had deteriorated rapidly since my last visit. She had the pinched, exhausted quality that I had all too often observed in my more serious patients, and her eyes stared out pitifully over the sharp ridges that her cheekbones had become. She had combed her hair, but it was still dishevelled, spreading around her shoulders. Her hands, resting on the sheet in front of her, might have been those of a dead woman.
    ‘Dr Watson!’ she greeted me and her voice rasped in her throat. ‘Why have you come to visit me?’
    ‘Your sister-in-law asked me to come, Miss Carstairs,’ I replied.
    ‘My sister-in-law wants me dead.’
    ‘That is not the impression she gave. May I take your pulse?’
    ‘You may take what you wish. I have nothing more to give. And when I am gone, take my word for it, Edmund will be next.’
    ‘Hush, Eliza! Don’t say such things,’ her brother scolded her.
    I held her pulse which was beating much too rapidly as her body attempted to fight off the disease. Her skin had a slightly bluish tinge which, along with the other symptoms that had been reported to me, made me wonder if her doctors might be right in suggesting cholera as the cause of her sickness. ‘You have abdominal pain?’ I asked.
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And aching joints?’
    ‘I can feel my bones rotting away.’
    ‘You have doctors in attendance. What drugs have they prescribed?’
    ‘My sister is taking laudanum,’ Carstairs said.
    ‘Are you eating?’
    ‘It is the food that is killing me!’
    ‘You should try to eat, Miss Carstairs. Starving yourself will only make you weaker.’ I released her. ‘There is little more I can suggest. You might open the windows to allow the air to circulate, and cleanliness, of course, is of the first importance.’
    ‘I bath every day.’
    ‘It would help to change your garments and the bed linen every day too. But above all, you must eat. I have visited the kitchen and seen that your meals are well prepared. You have nothing to fear.’
    ‘I am being poisoned.’
    ‘If you are being poisoned, then so am I!’ Carstairs exclaimed. ‘Please, Eliza! Why will you not see sense?’
    ‘I am tired.’ The sick woman fell back, closing her eyes. ‘I thank you for your visit, Dr Watson. Open the windows and change the bed clothes! I can see that you must be at the very pinnacle of your profession!’
    Carstairs ushered me out and, in truth, I was glad to go. Eliza Carstairs had been rude and scornful the first time we had met her and her illness had only exaggerated these aspects of her character. The two of us parted company at